Save Article

Obama to Woo European Public on Overseas Trip

WASHINGTON -- Barack Obama, heading overseas for the first time as president next week, aims to use a combination of summit protocol and campaign flash to corral support for his programs.

Facing political headwinds but with a European public still on his side, Mr. Obama will attend three high-profile international events -- the meeting of Group of 20 nations that kicks off Wednesday evening in London, a North Atlantic Treaty Organization meeting at the end of the week, and a European Union-U.S. summit in Prague on April 5.

Barack Obama

But Mr. Obama also intends to extend his efforts beyond official meetings. He will hold a town hall-style meeting at a sports arena in Strasbourg, France, European diplomatic officials said. And the White House is looking for a site in Prague for the first public foreign-policy speech of Mr. Obama's presidency, according to Petr Kolar, the Czech Republic's ambassador to the U.S.

Turkish press reports say Mr. Obama's visit to Istanbul after the Prague summit will include a stop at the Hagia Sophia, a Byzantine-era church converted to a mosque under the Ottomans, and a stop at the national Sultan Ahmed Mosque.

The emphasis on including public events, a deliberate nod to Mr. Obama's successful tour through Europe as a presidential candidate, stands in contrast to the divisions that have opened on policy since he took office.

Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topol&aacute;nek, who resigned on Thursday after an earlier parliamentary vote of no-confidence, this week called Mr. Obama's economic prescriptions "the road to hell." Paris and Berlin have been openly hostile to the U.S. president's calls for more fiscal stimulus. And his pleas for more troops for Afghanistan have given way to more modest calls for help in propping up Afghanistan and Pakistan's civilian governments.

A senior administration official shrugged off those concerns. "If there's a positive receptivity to the president, it does help enhance America's image abroad and moves along the agenda," the official said. "We're not afraid to be a world leader, and people want to be seen with our president. That's a good thing."

Mr. Obama spent much of his campaign lamenting his nation's diminished status and influence after eight years under President Bush. On his trip, President Obama will meet leaders from more than 40 countries and will see first hand whether the damage he spoke of is there and lasting.

"President Obama has been talking for many months, if not a year or more, about the need to restore U.S. leadership around the globe," said
Reginald Dale,
a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies' Europe program. "This trip is the first chance, actually, to start doing something about that."

In a news conference Tuesday, Mr. Obama said the steps he has taken have been aimed at "restoring a sense of confidence and the ability of the United States to assert global leadership."

Such trips are carefully choreographed and many of the tensions evident before the meetings will have been defused ahead of time.

Mr. Obama's star may have dimmed slightly in the U.S., but politicians in Europe hope some of his stardust rubs off on them. "Everybody's jockeying to be seen by his side," says one person familiar with the preparations for the NATO summit. "People are squabbling to be in the camera shot with him and be seated next to him."

That won't do much to tackle some differences. The U.S. had wanted each nation to sign on to a 2% of gross domestic product target for a fiscal boost to help the global economy, but isn't likely to press the point after France and Germany publicly opposed it.

Spain's Prime Minister Jos&eacute; Luis Rodr&iacute;guez Zapatero said on Thursday that the nation has room for a fresh fiscal stimulus if needed, but that Europe should wait until the summer to see if the current round of spending measures and tax cuts has an effect. Spain has one of Europe's biggest stimulus plans, with tax cuts and new spending measures valued at &euro;21 billion ($29 billion), or 2% of GDP, in 2008 and &euro;31 billion, or 3% of GDP, in 2009.

The U.S. will agree to Franco-German calls for heightened regulation of the global financial system but -- like the U.K. -- interpret this differently when it comes to making policy, U.S. and European officials say.

Differences will also remain beneath the surface at the NATO meeting, or at least couched in the most diplomatic terms, officials say. The U.S. would like its European partners in NATO to commit more troops to Afghanistan, and wishes some, such as Germany, would ease restrictions that prevent their forces from playing a combat role.

But the U.S. isn't expected to press the point at the NATO summit, focusing instead on the alliance's 60th birthday, the readmission of France into NATO's military command, and the expected future admission of new members Croatia and Albania.